Delphi Complete Works of Thorne Smith (Illustrated), page 72
“Sit down and rest,” said Sandra quietly. “Don’t you think you’re laying it on a little strong? I stood you as a lion and a kangaroo without turning a hair. When you were a seagull and a goldfish I did what little I could to protect your interests. When you were a cat I actually took you to bed with me. Not satisfied with your past achievements it now seems that you’ve begun to make up animals, combining them, trying to be three animals at once. It’s a trifle more than a potential wife or mistress can stand. I think it’s very silly to make up animals. Have you seen yourself yet? Look.”
She took a small mirror from her vanity case and held it up before Mr. Lamb. With a strangled, gasping squawk he flopped down the steps and shuffled away as fast as his queer, ill-fashioned legs could carry him. A thin film seemed to have settled over his eyes. He could see only dimly. He was totally unfitted for the world in which he found himself. His heart was heavy, however, with human despair.
Sandra rose quickly from her chair and looked after the retreating animal. Once she called to him, but Mr. Lamb did not appear to have heard her. Filled with misgiving for the safety of this defenseless creature she hurried to Mr. Lamb’s home, but he was not there. Hebe greeted her at the door and gave her an account of what had taken place at court, after which they sat down and wondered what had become of Mr. Lamb.
The subject of their speculations knew neither what to do or where to go. News of a strange animal being at large spread rapidly through the countryside. Parties were organized to capture or to kill this animal. Big, quick-tempered, hard-biting dogs were pressed into service. The animal was different, therefore it did not belong. It was the invariable attitude of humanity — destroy what you cannot understand. Mr. Lamb became a hunted thing.
His trail was picked up on the outskirts of the town. Soon he heard the hue and cry behind him. Sheer panic weakened his efforts as he hopped laboriously along. He was about to enter a wood when he spied a small hut before which a man was sitting, a man with vague, troubled eyes and a head of matted hair. Mr. Lamb recognized the man. He was the local half-wit, almost as far removed from his fellow men as was Mr. Lamb himself.
When the half-wit saw the winded and hard-pressed creature he showed neither surprise nor alarm. He rose from the ground and approaching Mr. Lamb, looked sympathetically into his dim eyes. “Tired,” he said as if to himself, “and thirsty. Scared near to death.”
The sound of pursuit was growing steadily nearer. Three dogs, nose to the ground, were streaming across the field. Behind them came the rabble of the town. The half-wit frowned and looked at Mr. Lamb.
“They’re after you,” he said quietly. “They’ve been after me for years. Come along.”
Mr. Lamb hopped after him to the hut and drank thirstily when the man gave him a cup of water. Then the man went out and stood before the door. In his hand was a heavy stick.
Within a few minutes Mr. Lamb heard the voices of his pursuers and the snarls of the dogs. The house was surrounded and shouts rang out.
“Leave the poor creature alone,” he heard the half-wit saying. “He’s not hurting anybody, and I won’t let you at him.”
The dogs were urged forward, and the crowd fell upon the struggling half-wit. In spite of his terror Mr. Lamb tried to come to his aid.
“There it is!” a voice shouted. “Get him.”
A large rock crashed against the side of Mr. Lamb’s head and the strange animal sank down, a crumpled, uncouth mass. A dog worried his tail, and by his side the half-wit was feebly trying to rise. Through bruised lips he was muttering something about the crucifixion of Christ. The crowd stood over the still animal with a feeling of great accomplishment, particularly the man who had thrown the rock.
When Mr. Lamb regained consciousness he was lying on a large marble slab. A group of near-sighted-looking gentlemen were examining him minutely. One of these gentlemen was clad in white. In his hand was a long, thin, and extremely businesslike knife. Mr. Lamb sat up abruptly and looked about him. The room in which he found himself was rigged out as a laboratory. To Mr. Lamb it had the appearance of a torture chamber. The men seemingly were highly excited. They were staring at Mr. Lamb with deep interest.
“Oh, I say,” said one of them in remonstrating tones, “that was really too bad of you.”
“How too bad?” asked Mr. Lamb, a trifle giddily.
“Well,” continued the man, “a moment ago you were a most remarkable type of animal. Now you’re only rather a commonplace sort of person.”
“You’re not so exceptional yourself,” replied Mr. Lamb, irritated by the man’s manner.
He swung round on the table and addressed another member of the group.
“I wish you would remove the knife from that unreliable-looking individual’s hand,” he said. “What are all of you trying to do anyway, murder me?”
“No,” replied the other. “This is a meeting of scientists. We were just going to find out what manner of animal you were. You seemed to be quite dead.”
“Well, I don’t seem quite dead now,” said Mr. Lamb. “And I’m not an animal. You’ll have to stick that knife into someone else, I’m afraid. I want to go home. My head hurts.”
“But aren’t you going to be that way any more?” one of the men protested.
“Come, come,” urged one. “Snap back for us, won’t you?”
“All I can say,” remarked a third, “is that as you were, you were a great gain to science and that as you are, you are not much of a contribution to the human race.”
“Won’t you even try?” pleaded a bearded individual. “Come now, make an honest effort. Try hard. Be an animal.”
“Yes,” urged still another member of the group. “Pull yourself together.”
“And you’ll pull me apart,” replied Mr. Lamb.
“I’d like to cut him open anyway,” remarked the man with the knife. “There must be something strange inside him. No one would ever know.”
Mr. Lamb slid hastily from the marble slab.
“Everyone would know,” he announced. “If you come a step nearer with that horrid-looking knife, I’ll let out a yell that will bring in the entire neighborhood, you cold-blooded, long-faced murderer. You look like a horse yourself. Why don’t you slit your own hide open?”
Mr. Lamb felt better after this little outburst. He walked to the door with a dignified step, then turned and faced the bewildered and disappointed scientists.
“The next time I turn into an animal,” he announced, “I’m going to call in an osteopath.”
It was quite late when Mr. Lamb reached home. The house seemed empty. He went directly to his study, and without troubling to switch on the light sat down in his usual chair. He wanted to rest his eyes to see if the pain would not leave his head. Through the doors to his little porch the starlight shone into the room. Presently Mr. Lamb became aware of the fact that a small red light was glowing steadily opposite him. He caught the aroma of cigar smoke.
“Are you satisfied?” came a voice through the darkness.
Mr. Lamb recognized the voice, and his heart began to beat a little more hopefully. He got up and switching on the light, stood looking down at the little russet man. That cheery individual was sitting exactly as Mr. Lamb had last seen him. In one hand he held a half-smoked cigar, in the other a half-consumed highball. His umbrella was neatly arranged on the floor at his side.
“I hope you are,” replied Mr. Lamb. “I’m fed up. You’ve ruined everything for me including the zoo.”
The little russet man smiled.
“Well, Mr. Lamb,” he said, “you’re all through now. It’s done you a world of good. Respectability almost had you. You could never have stood the strain.”
“I’m not respectable now, God knows,” said Mr. Lamb. “I’m the most talked about person in the nation. I’m divorced, disgraced, and forever marked as a freak of nature.”
“Do you regret your experiences?” asked the little russet man.
Mr. Lamb thought over the past few months and grinned.
“No,” he replied. “Not exactly.”
“The world has a short memory,” his visitor resumed. “And anyway, you should travel for a while. See something new, Mr. Lamb. As an animal you seem to have a faculty for getting yourself into trouble. As a man your life should not prove to be so devoid of interest. The best side of you is your bad side — bad, I mean, from the point of view of Mrs. Grundy and her friends. Develop that side. Drink, eat, love, and laugh to your heart’s content. Don’t worry about people who peer through windows. Don’t hurt others, but don’t let others hurt you. They’ll do it every time if they can get you on the run. The world envies successfully unmoral people. Also it hates them. What your generation refers to as a hangover is not necessarily a mark of shame. There’s plenty of room in the world for a decent-spirited drunkard. Sobriety is good for certain persons only. You are not one of them. And, by the way, if I were in your place I’d look up that half-witted chap who tried to help you out. I find him one of the most likable characters in the community.”
Mr. Lamb walked over to a table and picked up the decanter. He was considering the words of his guest. A breeze passed through the room, and Mr. Lamb, turning, saw that the doors to his porch were open. Evidently the little russet man had passed through them, because he was no longer present. Only his umbrella remained beside his empty chair, and as Mr. Lamb stood looking at it the umbrella rose from the floor and moved slowly across the room.
“Almost forgot it that time,” from nowhere in particular came the voice of the mysterious little fellow.
Mr. Lamb walked out on his porch and sat down. A small hand slipped through the darkness and came to rest on his. Mr. Lamb sprang up with a smothered cry of fear.
“For God’s sake,” he complained, “why is everybody creeping up on me in the dark? I’m as nervous as a bug.”
“We’ll have to do something about that,” said Sandra. “Sit down and keep your shirt on.”
Chapter XXII. In the Wake
SANDRA AND MR. Lamb were too much in the public eye to get married, so they agreed to play make-believe. However Mr. Lamb had extracted a promise from Sandra in the presence of Hebe and Melville Long to make him an honest man the moment they reached Paris.
Mr. Lamb had readily consented to go abroad for an indefinite period.
“If I stay here,” he had remarked at the breakfast table, where the suggestion had first been advanced by Sandra, “all my friends will be sitting around expecting me to turn into something for them. As far as business is concerned, I’m pow. A man who harbors the horrid fear that at any moment I may become a centipede or a panther is hardly in a receptive frame of mind to concentrate on a list of securities. Billings will have to carry on at the office, and Thomas will stand by the goods here at home.”
“I might run over with a contingent of Boy Scouts myself,” announced Brother Dug. “You’ll know when we get there because we’ll all be singing.”
“Tell us where you’re not going to be,” said Hebe, “and we’ll go there.”
Douglas grinned amiably.
Hebe and Mr. Long were married. During the last ten days he had proved himself useful in procuring the wrong tickets for the right boat or the right tickets for the wrong boat. The efficient Hebe had at last been forced to assume the responsibility of getting the party started. Mr. Long senior had been so pleased at the prospect of getting his son out of the house for some time to come that he had disgorged great quantities of money.
“I hope that at least you’ll be able to prove yourself a father,” the old gentleman had said upon relinquishing the check.
The three young people were now pushing Mr. Lamb up the gangplank. To outwit the newspaper reporters he was wearing a false beard above which his eyes peered out guiltily at the world. Unfortunately the beard fell off half-way up the gangplank. He quickly slipped it into his pocket, leaving part of it sticking out.
“I thought you were wearing a beard, sir,” observed his steward when he had placed the luggage in the stateroom.
“No,” explained Mr. Lamb. “That was someone seeing me off.”
When the steward was about to leave Mr. Long appeared wearing the beard and solemnly shook hands with his father-in-law. The steward departed baffled. Needless to say the party had been well primed for the occasion.
On the table in the Lamb suite reposed a bowl of animal crackers and a large Noah’s Ark.
“Don’t forget to sing,” ran the accompanying note from Brother Dug. “Love and kisses.”
The ship was now well under weigh. Several miles up the river two odd-looking characters were emerging from the pier shed — ancient Thomas and the vague-eyed half-wit, both of whom were already missing Mr. Lamb. That gentleman and Sandra were standing in the stern. Sandra was getting very close to him. They were both looking back at the wake of the ship. It was the same ship on which Mr. Lamb had once been such a disturbing stowaway. Sandra continued to cram herself against her companion. Mr. Lamb gave her a pinch of protest.
“Don’t hurl yourself at me like that,” he complained, looking nervously about him. “You’re practically sitting on my chest. I’m not an open subway door.”
Apparently Sandra did not hear him. She wedged herself even closer. Suddenly Mr. Lamb pointed to a weather-beaten old seagull raucously following the ship.
“See that old devil?” said Mr. Lamb. “Well, I think I know that gull. He asked me to eat fertilizer with him once.”
“Do you happen to know who’s aboard this ship?” asked Hebe, brightly, suddenly appearing at the rail.
“I hope not,” replied her father. “Who?”
“Sapho and Leonard Gray,” announced Hebe.
Mr. Lamb stood as if contemplating a rapid descent into the sea. Sandra seemed highly delighted by the news.
“Married or not?” she asked.
“Not,” said Hebe briefly. “Leonard doesn’t know the meaning of the word.”
“A nice ship, this,” observed Mr. Lamb.
“Where do you get off?” demanded his daughter.
Mr. Lamb turned back to the rail and gazed along the trailing wake, where the old seagull and his mob were scurrying greedily among the waves. A suggestion of a grin was beginning to gather slowly at the corners of his lips.
“Well, two can play at that game,” thought Mr. Lamb. “Or rather four . . . and a very amusing game it is.”
Then he addressed himself to his daughter.
“Hebe,” he said, “with your usual efficiency, will you discover if the bar is working yet?”
“Go on, Hebe,” urged Sandra. “He’s been sticking his head in and out of the smoking-room so often, the stewards think he’s trying to play peek-a-boo with them.”
And Hebe scuttled away on her edifying quest.
Did She Fall? (1930)
First published in August 1930, Did She Fall? concerns Emily-Jane Seabrook, a seductive wrecker of men, who is engaged to Barney Crewe, a dreamy quixotic artist. They had met for the first time two weeks ago. One of the men in Emily’s past is Daniel Crewe, Barney’s older brother, who owns a seaside estate near New York. Emily is also blackmailing Sam, a former lover of hers and Daniel’s best friend, who committed murder whilst in college. At a party to announce his brother’s engagement, Sam tries to stab Emily-Jane, but misses, slicing Daniel instead. Daniel, realising that Sam is intent on killing her, decides to save his friend and do the job himself…
Some critics liked this book calling it, “a story with magnificent humor and a tantalizing mystery,” and “Far out of the routine or ordinary mysteries is this new book which you can’t put down until you’ve read the last page”. Dashiell Hammett suggested that, “at times the book approaches something akin to literature.” However, not everyone was of the same mindset, with some calling it, “a wordy book unworthy of Thorne Smith”. Another pointed out that, “This murder story is very entertainingly written and all true detective story readers will enjoy it; that is, they will enjoy it up to the last chapter… The author overlooks the fact that the sleuthing reader cares nothing about the ending as long as the mystery is unravelled and the villain brought to justice.”
Perhaps the best review though came from a critic in the late twentieth century, who observed that, “If F. Scott Fitzgerald had written a detective novel, it might have resembled Thorne Smith’s Did She Fall?.”
The 1937 edition
CONTENTS
Chapter One Death’s First Selection
Chapter Two: Silent Watchers
Chapter Three: Daniel and Barney
Chapter Four: Dan’s Last Try
Chapter Five: The Searching Blade
Chapter Six: Death Takes Steps
Chapter Seven: Down There
Chapter Eight: The Body on the Rocks
Chapter Nine: From Beach to Cliff
Chapter Ten: Care Sits on Crewe House
Chapter Eleven: Eyes That Looked on Murder
Chapter Twelve: Death Comes Indoors
Chapter Thirteen: Obviously Murder
Chapter Fourteen: How One Life Went Out
Chapter Fifteen: Munson Sits Alone
Chapter Sixteen: The Inevitable Draws Nearer
Chapter Seventeen: The Lost Domino
Chapter Eighteen: The Breaking Point
Chapter Nineteen: The Face in the Picture
Chapter Twenty: All the World and Places
Chapter Twenty-One: Reunion
For MOM and POP
sometimes, but rarely, known as
MR. and MRS. WILLIAM SULLIVAN
also for
MADELE WILSON
with gratitude and esteem
